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Selling Obesity at School

The federal school lunch program, which subsidizes meals for 30 million low-income children, was created more than half a century ago to combat malnutrition. A breakfast program was added during the 1960s, and both were retooled a decade ago in an attempt to improve the nutritional value of food served at school.

More must now be done to fight the childhood obesity epidemic, which has triggered a frightening spike in weight-related disorders like diabetes, high-blood pressure and heart disease among young people. And the place to start is the schools, where junk foods sold outside the federal meals programs — through snack bars, vending machines and à la carte food lines — has pretty much canceled out the benefits of all those healthy lunches and breakfasts.

Federal rules that govern the sales of these harmful foods at schools are limited in scope and have not been updated for nearly 30 years. Until new regulations are written, children who are served healthy meals in the school cafeteria will continue to buy candy bars, sugary drinks and high sodium snacks elsewhere in school.

Fortunately, Congress seems to be waking up to this problem. A bill introduced by Representative Lynn Woolsey, Democrat of California, would update nutritional standards and give the Department of Agriculture broader authority to promulgate new regulations for food sold in schools that accept federal food subsidies. Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, has said that he will introduce similar legislation in the Senate.

Many states’ school districts have taken positive steps. But others are likely to resist, especially districts that sell junk food to finance athletic programs, extracurricular activities, even copier expenses.

Those districts should take note of a study released this year in West Virginia showing that the budgetary costs of switching from sodas to healthy drinks like fruit juices, milk and water were negligible. Even if the switch costs money, so be it. The schools should not be trading their students’ health to buy office supplies.

Over the last four decades, the obesity rates for adolescents have tripled. Unless there is decisive action, weight and inactivity-related disorders will afflict a steadily larger proportion of the work force and replace smoking as the leading cause of premature death.

A version of this editorial appears in print on , on page A22 of the New York edition with the headline: Selling Obesity at School. Today's Paper|Subscribe